On November 3, a fintech forum titled SWUFE & CDAR 2018 was convened here in the city by the Chengdu Municipal People’s Government, Southwestern University of Finance and Economics (SWUFE), as well as State Street Corporation, etc.

The event brought together experts from top universities and representatives from financial institutions at home and abroad, who probed into the hot-button topics in the fintech field.

Mr. Robert C. Merton, an American economist who shared the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1997 with Mr. Myron S. Scholes, was present at and addressed the forum as a keynote speaker. In his perspective, science and technology always develops with the innovation of finance, and fintech would enable more people to benefit more from finance.

At the forum, the Chengdu city government inked a cooperation agreement with the SWUFE, and the latter struck a deal with the State Street Corporation. The city will set up a lab for fintech innovation, which will serve as an international-level and nationally leading fintech innovation platform. To pool together global intelligent and industrial resources, the lab will be dedicated to the development of the financial center in western China.

Mr. Ian Martin, Executive Vice President of the State Street, expressed his confidence in the cooperation between SWUFE and his company. He said that the forum is of great significance for Chengdu's fintech development and financial reform.

Financial technology (FinTech or fintech) is a new trend emerging in the finance industry that uses data and technology to improve financial activities. Over the recent years, Chengdu has seen a boom in the fintech industry. The Jiao Zi Fintech Dreamworks, established in 2016 by the Chengdu Financial Holding Group Co., Ltd, is expected to have an operation space of over 150,000 square meters and attract around 15,000 fintech professionals by 2019.